[bperboy]

Okay,
I've got a passive pickup for my violin. I run this into the line in on my macbook pro, and increase the gain until you can hear it. This also increases the hum significantly.

Question number 1: I know that the passive nature of my pickup would require amping in between the violin and the computer. Can I use any of my headphone amps to do this?

I'm trying to record a few of Telemann's Canonic Sonatas for Violin, and I'd like to record the 'round' part of it by myself, playing with myself. In effect, a solo duet

I've got audacity installed already.

Question number 2: What is the best way to do record myself twice? I've encountered some latency issues in garageband, and I haven't really seen that in Audacity, but there must be something off, as when I record, it doesn't really match up.

I'd be most appreciative for answers to this dilemma, as if I don't solve it, I'll have to think of something else to give for Christmas, which will in turn, take away funds for headphone stuff

 

[bperboy]

What was recommended to me for recording with my pickup from the manufacturer was "the addition of a good quality active DI box, or quiet pre-amp, preferably with high impedance input, would improve levls and signal to noise ratio and should prevent degradation of tone."

I'm not sure how my Mini3 would be, or if I'll need to buy another box. If so, whats a good one under $100?

 

[Akathriel]

You can buy a cheap mixer with some pretty decent preamps from Behringer, or Yamaha in you're price range. I'm also fairly certain ART DIO has a preamp product in your price range as well. I hope I'm wrong but are you using the A/D in your mac? You may be able to solve the hiss, this way but its still gonna sound like ****. My advice would be to get some quality AD with built in pres and feed it to the opticall in on your Mac. Better yet might be an analog mixer with a firewire ad interface. You can do this for 300, and do it right for 500.

But the ART DIO preamp is like 65 bucks, see if that solves your problem and if you're satisfied consider yourself lucky.

 

[bperboy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Akathriel /img/forum/go_quote.gif You can buy a cheap mixer with some pretty decent preamps from Behringer, or Yamaha in you're price range. I'm also fairly certain ART DIO has a preamp product in your price range as well. I hope I'm wrong but are you using the A/D in your mac? You may be able to solve the hiss, this way but its still gonna sound like ****. My advice would be to get some quality AD with built in pres and feed it to the opticall in on your Mac. Better yet might be an analog mixer with a firewire ad interface. You can do this for 300, and do it right for 500. But the ART DIO preamp is like 65 bucks, see if that solves your problem and if you're satisfied consider yourself lucky.

Yeah, I'm using the built it line in, not the optical. I do have an audigy zs notebook, but there is no pcmcia slot on my macbook pro, and I'm not sure that would be much of an upgrade anyways.

 

[bperboy]

Would the Fishman GII be any good?

 

[Akathriel]

Sure it seems like a decent product, although I have to say I have no experience with pick up preamps and my reccomendations were geared towards more conventional mics. I still think a decent a/d with a built in preamp is the way to go but it is more expensive.

I have not really used either Audacity or Garageband for this purpose, and I dont know how limited they are as DAWs. But my reccomendation is to make sure you set the tempo and time signature correctly in the program and use the metronomes built into the programs at the same tempo to make your recordings. If the metronome has a count in feature, use that so you can be good and ready. I would not listen to the first part while you're recording the second.

If it still doesnt match up, you can try setting the DAW step size to really small and do some adjusting. (for Garage Band this might be like 32nd notes and maybe seconds in Audacity). Hope this helps.

 

[bperboy]

Do you have any links to the ART preamp, or any of the other things you suggested?

 

[Akathriel]

http://www.zzounds.com/cat--ART-Micr...-Preamps--2929

http://www.zzounds.com/item--BEHADA8000

http://www.zzounds.com/item--MACONYXSAT

http://www.zzounds.com/item--TAPLINKFW4X6

http://www.zzounds.com/item--CMEMATRIXKFW

http://www.zzounds.com/item--BEHFCA202

 

[bperboy]

Thanks! I emailed AMB, hoping that my Mini3 was able to be used as a preamp.